


His dreams possible, pulsing, & right there

by gloss



Category: A Witch Named Finn (comic), Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Finntrospection, Gen, au - witches, gen - Freeform, little_corvus, small tender boy witches, sneaker freak, the real license is the friendship we forged along the way
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-02
Updated: 2018-05-02
Packaged: 2019-05-01 01:09:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14509209
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/gloss/pseuds/gloss
Summary: Boy witch Finn just wants to do well.





	His dreams possible, pulsing, & right there

**Author's Note:**

  * For [marginalia](https://archiveofourown.org/users/marginalia/gifts).



> Equally an AU of Finn & Poe as it is fanfic of little_corvus's [comic](https://twitter.com/little_corvus/status/968300415040110592) ([PDF](https://gumroad.com/l/qVLuG)). This story is for them, because their work has given me so much joy, and for my friend marginalia, who obtained the zine for me at ECCC, and with whom I've loved both AUs and witches for years and years.
> 
> Thanks to Orchis and galacticproportions for writing dates, audiencing, and forever inspiration.
> 
> Title from Danez Smith's poem, [Dinosaurs in the Hood](https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poetrymagazine/poems/57585/dinosaurs-in-the-hood).

Turns out you don't have to wait until you're thirteen to take the preliminary witch's license test. You can take it any time! Everyone just _says_ you have to be thirteen because that's what's customary.

The news spreads quickly through the afterschool magic class. Someone's older sister or cousin told them and they're passing it along and for the rest of class, no one can concentrate. The origami-charms they're supposed to be doing lie crumpled, abandoned and ignored, on the floor.

Thinking it over, Finn decides that "customary" is a dumb reason to do anything. It sounds to him like an excuse, like "because I said so". This is the sort of thing people in charge get away with saying and believing exactly because they _are_ in charge. 

Finn hangs back when class is over. Poe, his best friend, has to hurry home. His familiar was at the vet's today getting fixed. A round, opinionated little calico cat, BB made Poe promise to be there when she woke up, _or else_. Poe's familiar came from his mom, the daughter of _her_ familiar. When your family's magic, a lot of things come easier. Finn doesn't have a familiar. He's still not settled, at school or home or in magic. He's not sure if he ever will be. 

When everyone's gone, the classroom seems to double in size. All the noise and chatter are replaced by empty space widening around each desk and pushing the ceiling up. Finn bends over his desk, legs wrapped around the built-in chair, to focus on his flower. His peaked hat keeps sliding down his forehead and he shoves it back up with the heel of his hand.

Finn's determined to practice the origami until he can get it right. Everyone was so distracted by the gossip that no one did very well, but Finn is only concerned about his own shortcomings. The first task was to convince paper to fold into a swan without touching it. After that, encourage a paper flower to become real. His swan looks pretty good but his chrysanthemum is still lopsided. 

"You're thinking too much about the petals," Ms. Holdo tells him as she passes. She's cleaning up and sounds impatient. "Create the whole blossom. Let the details take care of themselves."

Not entirely sure he understands, Finn nods politely and stands up. He likes being on his feet for this. He tries the spell again: a polite request to the various forces of order and design for what he seeks; a little puff of air from his lips (he's not supposed to take a breath before each spell, but he acquired the bad habit early and now he can't stop); and _presto change-o_! His red tissue paper finally rustles around itself and becomes a more than passable flower. 

When a spell works, he just feels _good_. It's not the satisfaction of doing well in regular school, like solving a word problem or finishing reading a chapter, though it's that, too. It's almost a physical sensation, like a hug, but for his heart. He can't describe it very well, even to himself, but there's no doubt about the fact that he does feel it. Sometimes he pictures it like a big yellow sunflower bursting into bloom, right inside his skull, radiating warm light, all the way down into his chest.

He touches a petal to check, and it feels velvety-thin, very real. He smiles and thanks the various forces that helped him.

"Nice work," Ms. Holdo tells him, "but you're still blowing on it." 

She isn't really looking at him, but instead packing her bag. She brushes a lock of violet hair from her eyes as she looks around for her coat.

Finn goes up on tiptoe inside his new Half Cabs. He got all As and perfect attendance last term and selected these as his celebration gift. When he tilts his head toward her coat and breathes out, it rises from where it slithered off the hook and floats over to Ms. Holdo's hand.

She slips it on, saying thank you, and jerks the belt tightly into a knot around her waist. "Ready to go?"

"Is it true?" Finn tightens his hands into fists; his flower tips over, but that might just be a draft. "About the license exam?"

Ms. Holdo's expression changes, but only slightly. For a few moments, all the exhilaration of the classroom gossip freezes inside Finn, and the sunflower sheds its petals and droops, and he gets a little scared. Not scared-scared, but worried. Tense. He might be asking too much, or bothering her beyond her job description, or making too much of himself.

"I don't think you're ready," Ms. Holdo tells him. She pulls on her coat and fixes her hair again. "You're very new at this."

She's his teacher, so she should know. But Finn has been called stubborn for about as long as he can remember (all eleven years or so). Maybe she _doesn't_ know. Maybe he'll have more luck elsewhere.

*

After consulting with Poe during lunch the next day, Finn asks his foster dads. He starts with Chirrut, since he was the one who enrolled Finn in magic class in the first place.

They're sitting at the tiny kitchen table, playing chess, when Finn clears his throat.

"Something's bothering you," Chirrut says. He's kind of spooky that way, but it doesn't scare Finn. It's actually pretty cool, how sensitive Chirrut is. He's blind but he feels the presence of people's moods like they're just as real as the rest of us. "Other than my brilliant chess strategy, that is."

Finn grins and sits up a little straighter. "Did you know that you don't have to be thirteen to take the exam?"

"Which exam is that?" Chirrut's hand hovers over the board. He keeps the whole game in his mind, plays it there and only uses the pieces for Finn's convenience. Someday, Finn has promised himself, he'll be able to do that, too.

"The magic one," Finn says. "What other ones are there?"

"How should I know?" Chirrut smiles as he takes one of Finn's last pawns. "You're the one who brought it up."

"But you don't have to be thirteen!"

"Yes, I know."

"Why didn't anyone tell me?"

Chirrut shrugs. "Curious as you are, we can't tell you _everything_ all at once. That would be exhausting."

Finn rolls his eyes and Chirrut clucks his tongue at him. How does he _do_ that? Somehow he always knows, even when Finn's perfectly quiet. Since he's already been caught, Finn sticks his tongue out, too. When Chirrut laughs, Finn says, "it's not fair!"

"What's this?" his other foster dad asks from the kitchen. "You're not cheating again, are you, Imwe?"

"Don't scare the child," Chirrut tells him.

"Sorry, Finn, he totally doesn't cheat," Baze says. He leans in the doorway with his after-work beer in his hand. "Not when he plays with you, anyway."

Finn frowns, looking back and forth between them. It can be pretty hard to tell whether they're joking or teasing or being serious. "I want to take the exam."

Nodding, Baze takes a sip of his beer. "You think you're ready?"

Chirrut reaches over and wiggles his fingers, so Baze passes him the can. "Why not wait a little longer?" he asks, then drinks. "Who's chasing you?"

"No one's chasing me," Finn says.

"Except you, yourself."

Finn looks down at his hands in his lap, then back up. "What does that mean?"

Baze is standing behind Chirrut now, hand on his husband's shoulder. His thumb absently strokes the hollow behind one tendon in Chirrut's neck. "It means maybe you're in too much of a hurry."

Finn screws up his mouth in the expression that Baze calls his "lemon-sucking face". 

"Why do you want to take it now?" Chirrut asks gently. "Is there something it will let you do that you can't do now?"

Other than practice magic without an adult nearby, there isn't. Finn isn't interested in any of the perks, not really. It hadn't occurred to him that those were important. Anyway, the first thing you learn about magic is that you shouldn't do it for selfish reasons. He likes that, quite a bit in fact. There isn't any other subject in school that talks about its own ethics.

He just wants to be the first in his class to be licensed. Maybe he'll be the youngest witch ever to get the license, or at least the youngest of this generation. Recognition, that's it. It would be cool, that's all.

"You want a little glory," Baze says.

"No! I just want—" Finn slumps back in his chair. "I just think I should take it. I'm ready. It'd be cool."

"Let's put a pin in this," Baze suggests. "Dinner still needs fixing and _someone_ needs to finish his homework."

Chirrut snorts. "I just have a few more articles to read, it won't take long."

He's been working on his divinity degree for years now. He'd have been done forever ago, but he keeps changing the focus of his thesis. 

"So there's no harm in doing it now." Baze pats Chirrut on the shoulder as he turns back to the kitchen. "Finn? Come help me with the casserole, please."

Sulkiness weighing him down, Finn drags himself into the kitchen. He mixes up the mushrooms and seitan with gravy, then, under Baze's careful watch, chops celery and zucchini. When it's all ready, they top the casserole with leftover mashed potatoes.

"Slide it in on the middle rack, that's great," Baze says from where he's washing the greens for salad. "And no peeking! Opening the oven just slows everything down."

"I _know_ that," Finn replies. "I'm not dumb."

"Hey." Baze stops what he's doing, even puts down the colander and turns to face Finn. Usually his mustache makes him look like he's frowning even when he isn't, but he is frowning now. "I would never say that."

Now Finn's embarrassed and he wishes he knew how to vanish. There has to be a transfiguration charm for that. Except he couldn't use it to escape, that would be selfish. So he's trapped. "I know. Sorry."

"Finn." Baze has a way of sounding gentle even when he's getting ready to be mad at you. "You really want to do this test, huh?"

Oh. Maybe he's not mad? Finn may have been here for almost a year now, but he's still learning how their moods work, what sets them off, what makes them look sad. It's like magic, or math, a never-ending process. Other foster homes, he could suss this sort of stuff out pretty quickly, but Chirrut and Baze are different.

Finn sticks out his chin. "I can do it."

"Confidence is important." Baze goes back to rinsing the greens. "Let me talk to Chirrut and your teacher, what do you say?"

"You could just say yes now," Finn points out.

Baze chuckles like that was a joke, which it was _not_. "Hand me the peeler, please."

*

After dinner on weeknights, Finn gets an hour for what the husbands call Contained Screen Damage. He can text, or play a video game, or be on the computer, or watch TV. This week, he’s been watching _Funny Face_ in 20-minute installments, and as much as he wants to know what happens next, he has more important, pressing matters. Given what they’re putting him through, he has to text Poe right away.

_They have to “talk it over”. :(_

Poe texts back immediately. _dat’s so dumb! ::poo::_

 _I know._ Finn switches the phone to his other hand and knuckles his eyes.

_u shd take it neway_  
_THEN tell em!!_

Finn imagines what that would be like. It could work, maybe? So far as they’ve been able to learn, no one has to sign anything or accompany you to the license office. He and Poe could just go and do it themselves. Then, when they pass with flying colors, because of course they will, they can surprise everyone. Maybe invite Poe’s dad and the husbands out for dinner and give them the good news there.

He’ll have to get some money together to afford that, but one problem at a time.

_FINN??????? WHERED YOU GO???_

_I’m here._  
_I’m thinking about it._

_coooooooool._ Poe texts exactly like he talks and like he does magic, in rapid bursts of enthusiasm and then long, drawn-out sounds of appreciation. _u can do dis! i believe in u!!_

 _ **We** can do this,_ Finn responds.

_wut no way im not ready!!_

That’s kind of true. Poe’s magic is still a mess and he mixes up words sometimes. But he’s also got a knack for doing it that even Ms. Holdo has to acknowledge. He just throws himself into the spells and thinks on his feet. Usually things work out, even if it’s just from sheer effort and enthusiasm on Poe’s part.

“You could stand to learn a little from each other,” she told them last month when Poe blew up a small rosebush by mistake and Finn overcounted feathers so the classroom was adrift in them. They’re still finding the occasional feather floating in the air or stuck to their clothes. “A little of you, a little of you, we’d have one good witch.”

Poe high-fived Finn at that, but Finn still isn't convinced it was a compliment.

*

On Friday afternoon, instead of walking home, Poe and Finn pool their money and take the crosstown bus eight stops to the licensing office. Poe chatters all the way there and sometimes Finn gets caught up in whatever topic's at hand, but the whole time he feels really nervous. He doesn't like bureaucratic offices, for one thing. He's seen more than enough social workers and Family Courts.

He has the exact same heavy sour feeling in his gut that he gets when he has one of those appointments. All these places are about judging you, each in their own way. He gets that now. What if he's not good enough? 

He doesn't know how to put that part into words, so all he says to Poe is, "I hate these places."

Poe frowns. "Buses?"

"No, these offices. Bureaucracy. The state."

"Like me and hospitals," Poe says, eyes widening as he understands. Poe _really_ hates hospitals. Last winter, right after they met, he sprained his wrist jumping off the first-story roof of the gym and refused to go the hospital until it was a day later and purple and black and his dad made him.

"Yeah, exactly."

Frowning a little, then huffing a breath to blow the hair out of his eyes, Poe nods and holds out his fist. They bump knuckles gently.

When they get off the bus, Finn stops to tie his shoelaces. He stays bent over longer than he needs to, hoping that a solution will come to him. When he finally straightens back up, Poe's waiting for him, witch's hat pulled down over his eyes. He holds out both arms and shuffles forward. "Zombie witch! Watch out!" 

"Maybe we should come back some other time," Finn says. He doesn't know if it's better to try, but fail and embarrass himself, or wait to take the test and probably pass it, but at the ordinary time. Like everyone else.

Poe shoves his hat up and squints against the sun, thinking it over. "How much money do you have left?"

"Two dollars and some change, why?"

"I've got a five! Let's get a milkshake," Poe says, setting off in the opposite direction from the office. "I think better on a full stomach."

"More like a bloodstream full of sugar."

"That, too!"

Inside the Chinese-Fried Chicken-Burgers & Shawarma restaurant, they sit next to each other in one of the two half-sized booths. The chocolate milkshake is on the table between them. They throw spells for the chance to take a sip. They didn't make up this game--it's the sort of game that everyone on a playground just knows, but they have refined it to their tastes. It's like rock-paper-scissors, but they have to animate the napkins to beat the other guy's version.

They call challenges--flying, crawling, mammal, swimming--and their paper-goods creatures do battle.

Finn's scorpion makes short work of Poe's ladybug.

"Unfair! Scorpions are _stingers_ not crawlers!"

"Ladybugs fly, though," Finn points out.

Poe scowls, shoulders drawing up like he's getting ready to argue. He does a double-take. "Really?"

"Really. Take a sip though, yours was really cool."

When he grins, you can see almost all of Poe's teeth. He has the biggest smile Finn has ever seen. "Rad, thanks!"

Finn rolls the paper wrapper from the straw between his palms. He isn't so nervous as he was, but despite a shared order of fried wontons and the shake, he isn't calm, either.

"You're right. We should come back another time," Poe says after sucking down several noisy sips. He elbows Finn and passes the cup over. "It's getting late and I should probably..."

He trails off. Finn knows he's giving Finn an out. Finn reverses the direction he's rubbing. The paper twists up and hardens between his palms. 

He didn't even _like_ magic class at first. It was so weird and nothing made sense and no matter how hard he studied, sometimes the spells just fizzled. Ms. Holdo isn't exactly the nicest teacher, for one. He could handle that fine, but it also seemed like everyone already knew each other. Worst of all, there weren't many guidelines for what to do. Finn told Chirrut after the first session that he didn't think it was an environment designed for success. Chirrut laughed, which Finn didn't expect and took some offense to. He'd been perfectly serious!

"Some places are messier than others," Chirrut told him, hand on Finn's shoulder as they walked home. In his other hand, Chirrut carried Finn's new witch's hat. 

"I don't like mess," Finn reminded him.

"And some experiences offer sweeter rewards," Chirrut continued, mysteriously and, if Finn were being honest, kind of annoyingly. 

"Yeah, but--" 

They'd come to their building. Before they climbed the broad stone steps to the front door, Chirrut turned Finn to face him. He placed the hat on Finn's head; it slipped a little ways down. "Give it a couple more tries?" Chirrut asked. 

Finn was about to argue some more. He had several lines of debate ready and waiting, from "magic will distract from doing my homework" to "the state might not approve of the occult", but they all fell away just then. Chirrut was _asking_ him, really asking, not couching an order in a fake question.

"Okay," Finn said and nodded. "I will." 

"Thank you," Chirrut said as he took off running up the stairs. "Last one in's a rotten egg!"

Things gradually got better, a little here, a little there. Meeting Poe, getting a better grasp of charm-chanting, the first time Ms. Holdo said he had a real grasp of things. It all started to add up.

At his fifth class, he made some macaroni dance. It's not the biggest spell, but he got it right on his first try. Once the elbows were in motion, the students were supposed to use them to decorate a cardboard picture frame to take home. Finn didn't want to bring something home that Chirrut couldn't fully experience.

He asked Ms. Holdo if he could use penne instead. Distracted by the swarm of tiny, divebombing pastina that Poe had somehow conjured up, she waved her hand. "Rigatoni all right?"

Before he could reply, several cups' worth of the thumb-sized tubes clattered onto his desk. "Thank you," he said, covering his nose and mouth with his shirt, lest he inhale any of the pastina. The minute stars were now zooming upward to the ceiling, then cascading downward like fireworks.

"I don't know what happened!" Poe yelled, helping some of the littler kids hide under their desks until things had cleared. "I'll fix it! I promise!"

Finn turned his back to the chaos and took a deep breath. He unlaced one of his sneakers and dangled it above the pile of rigatoni. He thought about what he wanted to happen and held his breath. He hoped to get it right, he asked the universe as politely as he could, and when he exhaled, the tubes of pasta formed a conga line along his shoelace. After a moment, it lifted like a king cobra, then dove through the centers of the rigatoni.

"Beautiful _and_ eminently stylish. In a word, snazzy," Chirrut said when Finn showed them the necklace that night at dinner. It danced over his palm and tapped each of his fingertips in turn. "Baze, I'll be taking this."

Baze's smile deepened the dimples under his mustache as he winked at Finn. "Fine, but I want the next trinket."

"Depends," Chirrut said, and passed his palm over the necklace. It rose and fastened itself around his neck. "I get right of first refusal, but then again, your personal style can use all the help it can get."

Finn wraps the paper from the straw around his finger and thumb, then goes back to rubbing it. He's about to figure something out, he can feel it. He doesn't know what, but he feels it coming. Gathering.

"Everyone already knows you're the best," Poe says after they've been quiet for a while. He shifts in the plastic seat. "Everyone who matters, I mean."

"Thanks." Finn knows he shouldn't care about that kind of thing, but it's nice of Poe to say so. "Sorry I dragged you out here for nothing."

"No worries!" Poe rocks a little, back and forth. "Can I finish the shake?"

"One sec." Finn nods as he drops the twisted-up straw paper on the table. It starts to move, jerking one way, flipping the other. He lifts the straw and drips some milkshake on the end of the paper. It writhes faster.

"Excuse me! That's very cold and unpleasant." 

That's a real snake on the table where the straw paper had been. At first it's the same color as the paper, but then it darkens slightly. Several bronze patches blossom down the back, joined by glittery blue speckles. The snake overall is much bigger than the paper. Even though it's coiled up, it looks about as long as Finn's arm, maybe longer. 

"I didn't do it!" Poe says, drawing up against Finn's side. More quietly, under his breath, he adds, "Finn?"

"I didn't, either," Finn replies.

"No one's in trouble." The snake's black eyes regard them. Its voice sounds like a young woman's, with a twang like someone from the south. She sounds warm and friendly. "It's nice to meet you. I'm Sophie."

"Finn," Finn says. He starts to stick out his hand but Sophie dips her head and shakes it. He gets the sense she's laughing. Can a snake laugh?

"If the joke's good enough, sure," she tells him. So she can read minds? He should be scared by that but instead Finn finds that he's smiling. Then she tilts her torso towards Poe. "Who's this, your partner in petty crime?"

"That's Poe," Finn says. 

Sophie bobs her head. After a second, Poe imitates the motion. "Hi, Sophie!"

"Hey!" the guy behind the counter shouts at them. "No animals in here! Get out!"

Sophie unwinds a little and slides toward Finn. "Shall we, then?"

"Shall we what?" Finn asks. Poe is pushing against him, but Finn stays still while Sophie slips across his hand and winds herself around his lower arm. The pressure feels nice, a gentle, persistent squeeze.

"Go home," she says. "Shall we head home?"

She's talking like any of this makes sense.

"Finn!" Poe says urgently as the cook comes toward them.

"We're going, we're going!" Finn tells him, shooting out of the booth. "Sorry, sir!"

They run all the way to the end of the block; Finn keeps his arm with Sophie around it pressed against his chest to protect her. From _what_ , he's not sure, but it seems like the right thing to do. 

"Are you his familiar?!" Poe asks excitedly when they careen into the bus stop. He shakes Finn by the shoulder. "Finn! You found your familiar!"

Sophie's tongue flickers out a couple times as she swings around, taking in their surroundings. "I don't like that term. Ultimately, it derives from the Latin word for household slave."

"Ew," Finn says and Poe nods rapidly, sputtering apologies.

"I prefer 'companion'," Sophie adds. She squeezes Finn's arm just a little harder. "Does that work for you, Finn?"

He opens his mouth but doesn't say anything, not at first. Sophie's holding his arm, and Poe is leaning against him, and just then, Finn realizes that he doesn't _need_ to make sense of any of this. There's no pressure to do anything. He just has to be. All of this, it's already happening, and it feels wonderful, and he can just go with it.

So he does.

"Yes," he tells her as he sways slightly, knocking gently against Poe. Shuddering loudly, the bus is arriving. "That works great."


End file.
